No Rest For The Weary Redux
by Draygon-Icewing
Summary: It has been six months since the destruction of the Sun Harvester. With most of the Decepticons having left Earth or in hiding, NEST's attention turns outward to searching for any more Autobot survivors. Instead, they find the war has only just begun.


It was always quiet on the cliff at night. Not many people used this place as a make out spot anymore. Most of the teenagers were always at the lake these days. Ellie smiled as she leaned back on the hood of her royal blue Saturn. Even though it had been her first car, she found it hard to give up. She still lived in the same house she had moved into after she graduated from college, drove the same car and came to this same spot every Friday night to enjoy the stars. Most people called her boring, but she had learned the comfort of routine and the air of dependability it brought. It had been that same dependability that had convinced Sam Witwickey's parents that she was a good babysitter. That job had supplied her with a steady flow of income when she was still in high school. She had to admit though, that Sam's father was reluctant to part with more money that he thought was necessary. His wife called him cheap. Though, Judy would more often than not slip an extra twenty dollars or so into her pocket to make up for her husbands extreme frugality.

Eloise Murdock smiled as she remembered back through all the trouble Sam had put her through. The kid could manipulate his father like no body's business. He had even gotten his dad to pay her more by telling him that a couple of neighborhood kids had stuck bologna all over Ellie's car. In truth, Sam and his friend Miles had done it as a joke but he made up for it even if he didn't tell the whole truth. Who knew that bologna could eat the paint off of a car? Though Ellie had a feeling that Sam did it just so she could get her car repainted. The old gray it had originally made it look like an old granny car. Royal blue looked much better on a Saturn anyway.

Ellie smiled as she leaned back, putting her hands behind her head. She closed her eyes as she heard someone driving up the road. She watched as a custom '09 bright yellow Camero pulled up beside her car. For a moment, everything was quiet, then the doors to the yellow Camero opened and two younger people got out. A young woman had stepped out of the passenger side. She was quite pretty with her dark hair in a ponytail. Out of the driver's side stepped out the same boy who had slapped bologna all over her car all those years ago.

Ellie's face split into a grin when she watched Sam come around and lock hands with the pretty girl. "Hey Ellie," he waved with his free hand, his smile meeting hers. "Ellie, this is Mikaela, my girlfriend." The tension in Mikaela face seemed to lessen when Sam stated that.

"Hey!" Ellie greeted them both with a wave of her hand as she slid off the hood of her car to stand in front of them. Now that she was on the ground, Ellie was a few inches shorter than Sam. "My little Sam is growing up," Ellie mock sniffed. "I used to baby-sit this kid when he was younger. Damn near rung his neck when he tried to surf down the stairs in the laundry basket." Mikaela snickered into her hand, watching as Sam became uncomfortable that his old babysitter was regaling his girlfriend with his idiotic misadventures. He only hoped that she wouldn't embarrass him too much. Ellie smiled. "So what have you been up to lately?"

She watched as Sam and Mikaela both just shrugged their shoulders in unison and said, "Nothing," with a rather peculiar look in their eyes.

Ellie eyed the younger couple. Mikaela could probably lie like a politician. Sam, however, could never keep a straight face even when telling the truth. She had discovered that when she had come out of the bathroom and found a 10 year old Sam with his head stuck in the couch cushions. She had never been able to get a straight answer as to why he was ass over tea-kettle in the couch with rug burns on his knees. Of course it could have had something to do with the missing banister on the second floor just above the couch.

"What happened to your leg?" Sam asked, trying to change the subject when he spotted her slight limp as Ellie walked back to her car.

"Would you believe I twisted it dancing in the shower?" Ellie shook her head as Sam guffawed. She had to admit that at the time it was not funny but looking back, it was pretty ridiculous. "In my defense, I was dancing to Metallica." Bumblebee chuckled softly as he turned on his radio and started playing the 'Enter Sand Man' chorus at full blast before falling silent again.

"I'm sorry," Mikaela cast a sidelong glace at Bumblebee. "I couldn't hear you over all that crazy."

Ellie blinked, not sure if Sam's radio was going to interrupt again. "I said, 'How did you two meet?'."

She listened as the two told a condensed version of their meeting and falling in love. They left a few things out which surprisingly didn't take too much from the story. Ellie nodded, leaning back on her car, her eyes tracing the lines of the Camero in front of her. "That's cute. What I really want to know is how you got your dad to fork over his half for that beautiful piece of machinery there?"

Sam stopped short, having to tap Bumblebee's hood to keep the Autobot from expressing any objection to being called a 'piece of machinery'. "Well...I kept my grades up and I had a few reports on the lack of safety features that older models had. Mom did the rest."

Ellie laughed, imaging Judy pestering Ron day and night until he caved in. The man put on a good show of being tough but he had no real backbone and almost never put his foot down. One glare from Judy had him muttering, "Yes, dear," in three seconds flat. "Or you could have just plastered lunch meat all over it and called it totaled."

Sam nearly fell off the Camero, or at least it looked like it did. Ellie would not acknowledge the car's shimmy when she had mentioned putting lunch meat on the paint. "Oh no! No way!" He shook his head so hard Mikaela could swear she could hear his marbles rolling around. Sam looked from his car to Ellie before he could form another sentence. "My dad would have figured out what was going on, then. He would have forced me to drive with a polka-dotted car. Not cool." Ellie gave him a hard look that made Sam stop short as he remembered how she was forced to drive around in a polka-dotted car. "Oh, yea..." He rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "Would serve me right, huh?"

"Well..." Ellie drew the word out as she mock pondered Sam's statement. "Your dad paying for the new paint job made up for it. But only just." Mikaela gave Sam a disbelieving stare, crossing her arms over her chest. Sam only laughed nervously, his discomfort robbing him of his ability to string together complete sentences.

Ellie looked down as her watch beeped. "Sorry I can't stay. But I've got a long day tomorrow. See you two later." She waved at the two as she settled into her car and made her way on to the road again, her headlights quickly disappearing into the darkness.

"My bologna has a first name..." Sam rolled his eyes as Bumblebee played the Oscar Meyer commercial.

"I was a kid, Bee!" The Camero remained silent. "Aww, come on! You should have seen the paint she had! It looked like a chunk of fog on wheels." The Camero stayed silent.

"Don't worry, Bee," Mikaela comforted. "If something like that ever happens I'd repaint you." Bumblebee played some religious music with harps. "Then I'd paint that chick robot from Metropolis on your hood." The music stopped and Bee's car alarm went off with an ear splitting siren. "How about Arcee instead?" Bumblebee stayed quiet, sinking on his suspension so much it looked like he was sulking.

"Thanks. Now he'll never let me ride with him ever again." Sam took on the same look of sulking and for a moment, Mikaela imagined the two should have been brothers.


End file.
